The way Thomas quietly soaks in the kiddy pool, hunched over his protruding belly, reminds me of the wrinkly old men on The Sopranos who sit in their steam rooms wrapped in a white towel. He has the belly, he has the bald head and the bow-legged hobble. He just needs a cigar to top it off.
A major heat wave has driven us outside for most of the day and evening, which has caused me to realize how much I love our yard. It’s like a park. In fact, yesterday I suggested we go to the park after dinner, but when After Dinner came I didn’t feel like leaving because our own yard was so much fun.
But this evening we brought a picnic dinner to our local farmer’s market, and after buying cherries and zucchini, we sat in the grass and partook – everyone except Ruthie, of course, because she no longer consumes meals during meal time. Though I don’t blame her for the apparent loss of appetite because there was another little girl who sat inches from our plates and just stared at us. Watching. Listening. It was unnerving and I kinda wanted to say ‘back off, bitch!’ but her mom was right behind her. Which brings up another point: what kind of mother ALLOWS her daughter to encroach so un-American-like on another human being?
We then let the kiddos splash around in the fountain, and when Thomas was done splashing he simply soaked like an old man in a hot tub. Ruthie, however, ran circles around the fountain at least eight times, which was fine with me because I knew she’d be tired enough to sleep when we got home.
It seems official: summer is upon us. I feel a constant film of perspiration coating my body. My cleavage and… other areas… are uncomfortably hot. And my kitchen hasn’t been cleaned in days because it’s just too damn hot to be in here.
But I’ve managed to keep my house ten degrees cooler than the outside, and my basement feels like it’s air conditioned. And all my flowers are blooming – the daisies, the lavender, the dahlias, the astilbe and hydrangea and roses – and we roast marshmallows in our fire pit, and my husband’s commute home today was ten steps up from his office to the kitchen, and my life couldn’t be any more perfect than it is right now.